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May 26, 2023

How to stay safe during tick season

Here are some tips from Dr. Andrew Handel, pediatric infectious disease

Here are some tips from Dr. Andrew Handel, pediatric infectious disease physician at Stony Brook Children's Hospital, on how people can prevent and treat tick bites.

With warmer temperatures come some of the most dreaded insects – ticks.

They creep, they crawl, they bite and most importantly, they can carry an assortment of pathogens that cause diseases. The disease most commonly transmitted by a tick bite is Lyme disease, with an estimated 476,000 Americans being diagnosed and treated for the disease each year.

Here are some tips from Dr. Andrew Handel, a pediatric infectious disease physician at Stony Brook Children's Hospital, about how people can prevent and treat tick bites.

A tick crawling on the hairy arm of a man before going for blood.

(Patrick Pleul / picture alliance / Getty Images)

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Taking a few extra precautions can help keep you and your family stay safe from ticks while spending more time outdoors:

An adult deer tick.

(Bill Davis / Newsday RM / Getty Images)

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If you do find a tick has latched itself onto your skin, follow these instructions to safely remove the insect:

Handel noted that people can order a free tick removal kit online from the Stony Brook Tick-Borne Disease Resource Center.